FBI uses TV to reach Muslims

By Caroline Drees, Security Correspondent

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The FBI will hold its first
nationally televised “townhall meeting” for Muslim and
Arab-Americans on Thursday in a effort to improve relations and
enlist their help in fighting terrorism, an FBI official said.

Paul Moskal, chief division counsel for the FBI in Buffalo,
New York, who will lead the meeting and field questions, said
the agency and the Arab and Muslim American communities needed
to overcome misconceptions about each other and foster closer
cooperation.

“What we want to do is let the public know that the FBI has
changed its mission after September 11, that our number one
priority is the detection and prevention of another terrorist
act. If someone in the public can help us accomplish that,
that’s our purpose,” Moskal told Reuters on Wednesday.

The meeting will be broadcast on Bridges TV, an
independent, commercial U.S. television network broadcasting
lifestyle and culture programs around the clock for a primarily
Muslim American audience.

The televised meeting is also part of efforts to encourage
Muslim and Arab Americans to report instances of post-September
11 backlash, intimidation, racism or harassment so the agency
can enforce their civil rights, Moskal said.

A third reason for the townhall meeting was that “we need
more Arab Americans, we need more Muslim Americans as FBI
agents and as FBI employees. So we use it to recruit as well,”
he said.

Muslim American groups have long accused the Bush
administration of neglect in the fight against terrorism, which
they say undermines a potentially priceless resource that could
be used to root out militants at home.

Muslim groups say the government must visibly engage their
community to undermine militants’ charges that Muslims are left
out of American society, and to ensure that Muslims do not feel
alienated and become targets for radical recruiters.

Estimates of the number of Muslim Americans vary between
three million and seven million.

Moskal said the FBI had long conducted local townhall
meetings, at which agents make contact with citizens and answer
questions about their work, in a broad range of ethnic,
religious and other communities throughout the United States.

But he said Thursday’s session was the first nationally
televised event targeting Muslim and Arab Americans.

Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesman for the Council on
American-Islamic Relations which is moderating the television
program, said, “It’s important to keep the lines of
communication open, for the FBI to understand the Muslim
community better and for American Muslims to better understand
law enforcement agencies.”

U.S. officials acknowledge they must do more to involve
Muslim Americans in counterterrorism efforts. But they say the
administration is already actively cooperating with Muslim
groups and say they enjoy greater access to the government than
ever before.